Marriage: Classified

“Oh, Jordan,” she said with a sudden intake of breath. A big tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m so glad to know—but even now that you’ve told me, I don’t recall a thing about it.”

He wanted to sit on the edge of her bed. Pull her into his arms. Comfort her.

But that could not be. For Sara was a lovely woman. He found her more than a little appealing—and a lot sexy. Contact with her, even innocently, could lead him to want more. Much more.

And that was why, for his own sanity, he didn’t dare touch his bride.

TWO DAYS LATER, Sara finally awaited her release from the hospital. The doctors had professed they had done all they could for her. They had given her the name of a private physician to see and had told her that her memory would return—sometime. They suggested hypnosis if her memory didn’t come back, but not till she felt up to it. She wasn’t sure she ever would.

But she could finally go home.

Not before facing one further ordeal, though: her father’s funeral. She had been told that the investigation details involving his body had been conducted thoroughly but fast, and he had already been prepared for interment.

As Sara dressed for the sad event in preparation for leaving the hospital, Jordan wasn’t with her. June Roehmer, dressed in a formal police uniform, was. June was a pixieish woman a few inches shorter and a year or two older than Sara.

“I’m really so sorry,” June told Sara as she handed her a deep gold blouse, long brown skirt and panty hose that Jordan had sent with her, “that you don’t remember how close you and I are.” Beneath her cap of short, dusty-blond hair, her gray eyes widened in dismay. “Of course, there are more important things going on with you now. Your dad wasn’t the easiest person for us uniform cops to get along with, but he was a fine chief of police. I’ve never heard anyone say otherwise.”

“Thanks, June,” Sara said. She wished the woman would stop talking for just thirty seconds. Sara’s head had been feeling much better—until faced with June’s garrulousness. “I’m sorry I don’t remember how close we were, too.”

She took the clothes from June and went into the bathroom to change, leaving the door slightly ajar. She felt a little dizzy, and her head still hurt. She would call for help if necessary.

“Do you remember anything about what happened in that hotel room?” June called. “I mean, all of us were upstairs at your reception. From what people are saying, you and your dad just left the reception with no explanation. Jordan was on a phone call on his cellular and didn’t see you go. And then—then…and you don’t remember any of it?”

“No,” Sara answered sadly, sitting on the edge of the closed toilet seat as she pulled on her panty hose. “I don’t recall why we went to that room…if Dad asked me to come along—anything.”

Dad. She had called her father “Dad.” Sara was sure of it.

Was that her first memory to return? She felt the corners of her mouth lift a little at this tiny milestone, but then she stopped her grin. She shouldn’t admit to anyone when any memory returned. Jordan and she had discussed that, and it made sense.

She had no idea whom to trust.

Even Jordan, though she could hardly tell him that. She certainly didn’t want to think that the handsome man who was apparently her husband had anything to do with her father’s murder and her own assault. But until she remembered who had done it, she had to be cautious.

She wondered where he was. He’d said he would be at the funeral. That June would be with her until then. But she wanted Jordan.

He had been the small bit of thread binding her to her sanity these past few days. She didn’t feel like the kind of person who was comfortable relying on anyone else…but she didn’t really remember what kind of person she was. And she still missed Jordan.

At least he’d given her a rundown of what, and whom, to expect at the funeral: a huge turnout of cops from all over, expressing support for one of their fallen comrades. And lots of news coverage.

She sighed as she put on her blouse and skirt. Jordan had promised that she would be protected from the media. She didn’t want to be part of the circus. She could not remember anything of interest to tell them, anyway.

Slowly, she walked back into her room.

June took a hairbrush from some items of Sara’s that Jordan had sent and began carefully brushing her shoulder-length black hair, obviously taking care to avoid the area around her bandage. Even her small tugs caused Sara’s head to hurt, though, and she took the brush from June. “Thanks, but I’d better do this.” She sat on the edge of the bed and brushed her own hair.

“I hurt you? Sorry.” June looked so contrite that Sara shot her a warm smile.

“You did a great job. I’m just a bit sensitive now.”

“You were always a little sensitive,” June told her with a smile that softened the words and the shake of her head. She stood in the middle of the hospital room with her arms folded. “I said so over and over—though I think you did the right thing about Jordan. He’s a hunk, isn’t he? And he’s always seemed very nice to me, no matter what Casper thought. But when you left the wedding reception with your dad, did he…I mean, might he have been giving you a final warning about Jordan?”

Sara froze. “What do you mean?”

“You don’t remember that, either?” June sighed. She uncrossed her arms and one edge of her mouth lifted in a worried expression. “Look, Sara, I don’t want to be carrying tales. You’d better ask Jordan.”

“I’m asking you.” Sara knew full well that June was eager to toss out whatever was on her mind; her reluctance was only for show. She stood and took a step toward this woman who professed to be a friend. Maybe she was a friend, but if this were the kind of game she usually played, Sara wasn’t sure why she’d have tolerated it before. “Please, June,” she said. “If there was something…awkward between my father and Jordan, I don’t remember it. Since we’re good friends, I need to rely on you to tell me what I need to know.”

June crossed the small gulf of space in the hospital room and grasped Sara’s hand. June’s was icy, making Sara immediately conscious of the warmth of her own hand. “All right.” June managed to sound reluctant, though her gray eyes sparkled in apparent anticipation. “You do need to know this, Sara. Not that I suspect Jordan of anything. As far as I know, he didn’t even leave the reception until hotel security got the call from the third floor. But Casper—your dad—didn’t like Jordan much.”

“I thought Jordan said that Dad—my father—recently hired him.”

“He did—after you got engaged. I don’t know the whole story, but it was something like Jordan used to know Stu, and you and he kept in touch after you saw each other three years ago. You got engaged, and Jordan decided to move here. It worked out great, since Casper needed another good detective. Jordan had been a Texas Ranger.”

Jordan had been a Texas Ranger? Why hadn’t he mentioned that? Of course, he hadn’t said much about her past or his background. He’d primarily told her about Santa Gregoria, its police force, his job and hers.

And the rest of what June had said—Sara’s head was hurting her something fierce once more. She pulled away gently from June’s chilly grip and leaned against the bed. “I still don’t understand. If Dad didn’t like Jordan, even if we were engaged, he didn’t have to hire him.”

June turned her back on Sara and began to look through her closet. “We need to make sure you’re not leaving anything here.” She pulled out a sweater and an extra nightgown that Jordan had brought for her and folded them neatly. “Anyhow, I suspect Casper wouldn’t have been pleased with any cop who was interested in his little girl.”

That didn’t sound correct to Sara, but she didn’t know why. “I see,” she said simply. Another question struck her. Its answer was important, she was certain. She looked down at the clothing items June had placed on the bed beside her and began stacking them into neat piles. “Who’s Stu?” she asked nonchalantly.

She glanced up from the corner of her eye as the movement across the room suddenly stopped. “Oh, Sara. I’m so sorry. You don’t remember that, either?”

Sara gnawed at the inside of her bottom lip for a moment. June Roehmer was one of the most annoying people she had ever met—or at least she thought so for now. “No, June,” she said as slowly as if June were the one with a mental deficiency. “I have amnesia. I hate it, but that’s the way it is for now. I don’t remember anything, or anybody, from the time before I was struck on the head. Now, tell me about Stu.”

She was suddenly certain she didn’t want to hear. Her hands went out in front of her in a protective anticipatory gesture, but she had already loosened June’s tongue.

“Stuart Shepard was your brother, Sara,” the policewoman said softly. There was a catch in her voice, as though telling this particular tale hurt her, too. Sara looked up and saw tears glistening in gray eyes beneath arched blond brows. “He died three years ago, honey. He and I had been dating at the time. Stu was a wonderful guy.”

“Stu?” The name spilled from Sara’s lips as though it belonged there. Did she truly remember him? She wasn’t sure, but she had a sudden mental image of a tall young man with short, dark hair, laughing hazel eyes and a quirky smile. “Dead? How?”

“He was murdered, Sara. Stabbed with a steak knife, like your father. And the killer has never been caught.”

SARA WOULD ARRIVE any minute. Jordan quashed the urge to call June Roehmer on her police radio to ask for their estimated time of arrival. He needed to prepare himself to be the rock Sara would lean on in the ordeal to come.

For Stu’s sake and Casper’s, he would take care of her. Properly. His own unanticipated attraction toward her would not get in the way. He wouldn’t let it.

He had been at the Santa Gregoria Community Church for an hour, checking out every cranny in the old, Gothic-style gray-stone church that was bleak and dismal enough to hold a funeral every day of the week. But this day, only one was scheduled: Casper Shepard’s. He would be buried in the church’s graveyard.

Jordan stopped outside the small vestry where Casper’s closed casket lay. The area smelled of burned wax. He stared at the simple metal casket that he had chosen. Would it have been Casper’s choice? Sara’s?

He remembered the similar funerary container that had been chosen for Stu three years earlier. Jordan sucked in a deep breath. I’m sorry, buddy, he thought. This wasn’t supposed to happen. But I promise you I’ll get the son of a—

“Everything in order, Dawes?”

Jordan turned rapidly to face Carroll Heumann, the assistant chief of police, now acting chief—and Jordan’s boss. Heumann was dressed in a formal blue uniform, though most of the time on the job he wore civilian style suits.

He scowled at Jordan’s own dark suit as though it emphasized his being an outsider.